


As Things Fall Apart

by kdoyochi



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Established Relationship, M/M, Time Skips, jaem and chenji are only mentioned!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-06
Updated: 2020-05-06
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:02:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24025534
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kdoyochi/pseuds/kdoyochi
Summary: Renjun had expected him to be here, fully knowing that he remains to be one of Jaemin’s closest friends. Still, seeing him now, the distance between them capable of being traversed with just a couple of steps, he finds himself a bit surprised.Sporting a black suit, hair styled neatly to the side, he looks different. He looks different, in a good way, laughing comfortably at something the person he is with is saying. Sure. Radiant. Him. He looks like the Jeno he fell in love with all those years ago.
Relationships: Huang Ren Jun/Lee Jeno
Comments: 18
Kudos: 60





	As Things Fall Apart

**Author's Note:**

> unbeta-ed / [Playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2DEzELoTQlVeAYPnSITVgz?si=vgAndnsbSv-k8iauDZELKg)

“... here,” Mark says. The words drown out amidst a sea of noise before Renjun could fully comprehend them.

“What?” he asks, putting his hand on the other’s back, urging him to continue walking because they were blocking the way.

“Jeno’s here,” Mark repeats once they’re standing in a corner.

He turns his head slightly to glance at him. “Okay,” he hums, eyes wandering to look for their friend. “I can’t find Nana.”

“Are you purposely ignoring what I just said?”

This time, Renjun fully turns to face the other. “I’m not. But this is Jaemin’s wedding, so can we please find him first?”

Mark looks him straight in the eye a second too long before letting his eyes wander to look for their friend who’s set to get married today. The mass of people, a few of whom Renjun can recognize from their college years, makes it hard to find the groom-to-be.

“There,” he hears Mark say as he’s checking his phone to see if he has any messages from Donghyuck. He lifts his gaze, following the other’s line of sight, but instead his eyes land on a familiar figure.

Renjun had expected him to be here, fully knowing that he remains to be one of Jaemin’s closest friends. Still, seeing him now, the distance between them capable of being traversed with just a couple of steps, he finds himself a bit surprised.

Sporting a black suit, hair styled neatly to the side, he looks different. He looks different, in a good way, laughing comfortably at something the person he is with is saying. Sure. Radiant. Him. He looks like the Jeno he fell in love with all those years ago.

< >

His wrist has begun to numb, middle finger already throbbing, when his phone buzzes—a message from Jeno. He drops the pencil from between his fingers, the dent on his thumb red and ugly.

 **jeno:** hey can i borrow ur pencils?

 _Speak of the devil and he doth appear_ , he thinks, typing out a reply.

Embarrassing memories involving the said devil have been swarming his mind the whole afternoon, like:

First year, first semester. Renjun, standing by the door, waiting to be let in by the professor. Renjun, learning later on that you do _not_ wait to be let in; embarrassed, walking to a seat two rows diagonally behind Jeno as the other met his eyes, a small smile sharing his embarrassment on his pink lips (yes, a necessary detail).

The onslaught of such memories makes him want to dig to the deepest of the earth. Maybe there he won't have to deal with such stupid things.

 **me:** which one?

 **jeno:** do u have 6H and 10B?

He waits for exactly one minute before he replies, trying not to appear too invested.

The next time he had seen that smile, quite rare as it was, Jeno only ever listening intently and writing down notes with not the most animated expressions, had been in his dormitory's lobby. Surprised to find his “attractive male classmate,” as he had relayed to Donghyuck a couple of meetings after, he had just instinctively waved at Jeno when they made eye contact, immediately regretting it as soon as his hand had left his side, expecting to be ignored, but Jeno had waved back, a soft smile on his face.

 **me:** yeah, but can you work here?

 **me:** i might need some, i’m working on my figure drawing

Technically, it isn’t a lie. 

He _is_ working on his traditional 2D project, but the bit with the might needing some was quite—well, questionable.

 **jeno:** okay thanks a lot jun !!! ill come over with my things in a few

He bites back the grin forming on his face.

Stupid butterflies in his stomach.

When he hears a knock, the sound resonating clearly in his ears, he tries his hardest not to make it too obvious that he had been waiting for it for the last ten minutes. He walks the few steps to the door slowly, schooling his face to a more cool and airy expression.

“Ah,” Jeno comes out with when he opens the door to his and Donghyuck’s shared room. The heat from his room dissipates to the outside the moment he does, so he grabs Jeno’s wrists to pull him inside, the other looking—for some reason—dumbfounded. _What a stupidly adorable face_ , Renjun thinks. “Where’s Hyuck?”

Renjun raises an eyebrow, although his back’s already turned away from him, cheeks tinted with a light shade of pink—either from the sudden cold or from holding Jeno’s wrist, he won’t admit—their wooden floor tiles feeling colder under his feet now as he walks back to his desk. “Isn’t he in your room? He said he’s gonna play Overwatch with Nana.”

“ _Ah_.”

As he settles back down to his chair, now back to his usual, unbothered (or so he’d like to think) demeanor, he glances back at Jeno, hoping to convey the message of _you’re acting really weird right now_ with his raised eyebrow.

“Okay,” Jeno mumbles, somehow looking everywhere but him.

Renjun continues to observe his _friend_ who’s standing in the middle of the room, tall and awkward and looking unsure. He wants to relay the fact that Jeno isn’t holding anything remotely related to why he needs to borrow his pencils—one hand occupied by a bag of takeout, the other doing something Renjun thinks is supposed to calm him, or something. 

This is probably how he looked, he thinks, that time he had run into Jeno in the hallway, Donghyuck by his side, Jaemin by Jeno's, and his ever so lovable friend had decided that it was an appropriate time to be loud and friendly, inviting the two to have dinner with them, fully knowing who one of the boys was. 

Now, that has led to this.

Maybe this will be another core memory, another one to grimace about a couple of months from now—if he still likes Jeno by then, anyway.

He probably will.

“Okay….” he hesitates, shooing the thought away, and gestures to his absent roommate’s table. “You can use Hyuck’s desk.”

Jeno doesn’t do anything for a few seconds too long, and, see, now Renjun feels a bit weird, too, and his neck is already starting to numb, so he twists his torso, one arm on his desk and the other on his chair for support. “What?” he asks, pointedly looking at Jeno, drawing out the vowel. “You’ve been–”

“I lied.”

“What…”

“I don’t need your pencils.”

“What……”

“So…” Jeno starts moving, finally, and he’s sure his face is contorted to show both agony and annoyance, because Jeno actually looks a little bit apologetic that he’s dragging whatever this is supposed to be out. His heart starts beating faster, the butterflies in his stomach in a frenzy. “Jaem told me…”

“What,” he repeats, making sure to add as much annoyance in his voice because he’s starting to think about all the worst possible things involving their friend Jaemin—had he maybe slipped something to him while he was drunk or hungover or dead from those all nighters all those times? “Just spit it out, oh my god, Lee Jeno, I swear–”

“ _JaemtoldmethatyoutoldHyuckthatyoulikeme_ ,” Jeno says without skipping breaths, and it takes Renjun a few seconds before he can fully comprehend what the other has just said.

When he finally does, he’s not quite sure how it’s physically possible to feel his heart still and beat so fast simultaneously. He’s about to throw up, though, he’s sure—now with wasps in his stomach, too, stinging his insides. He tries to say something. Opens his mouth. Closes it. The corners of his eyes start to sting. See, this is why crushing on an obviously straight close friend is troublesome and painful _and_ — 

He almost recoils to the deepest depths of the earth as Jeno quickly moves to the spot beside his desk, kneeling in front of him. The bag of food he has brought is forgotten on the floor, and his palms feel clammy on Renjun’s bare skin.

He’s really about to throw up.

“No,” Jeno tries to reassure. Renjun can only will his tears not to fall and the sinking feeling in his stomach to go away. “He didn’t really tell me. But he was being annoying and all giggly and, I mean, I thought they told you that _I_ like _you_ , so I got really upset and–”

“ _What_ ,” he blurts out, head turning so fast he must have pulled some muscles.

Jeno flinches, hands recoiling back to himself.

“Yeah, uhm." Licking his lips, nervous, retreating back to avoiding his eyes. “I wanted to say I like you.”

Renjun stills for a few seconds. The spot where Jeno’s hands were still electric, his blood circulating too fast everywhere in his system that he feels all jittery. Jeno looks horrified, teeth sinking into his lower lip harsh enough Renjun’s sure he’ll draw some blood. 

It takes a few seconds more, thousands, hundreds, tens, maybe, of trying to process what had just happened for Renjun to finally break out of his stupor and laugh out loud—slowly, slowly, slowly, until his shoulders are visibly shaking.

The relief that floods him isn’t like any he’s ever experienced in his life, and perhaps that’s why it floods through Jeno, too, the latter looking at him a bit horrified, then confused, then hopeful.

“What?” Jeno asks, placing his clammy palms back on Renjun’s thighs. It sends a tingle through his entire body. Maybe all the embarrassment has paid off, has led to this one moment.

“Are you sure about this?” he asks, cheekbones already hurting from smiling too much. For good measure, just to check if whatever this is is really happening, Renjun places his hands on top of Jeno’s and presses down. The grin on the other’s face has turned into that full-on eye-smile of his, a tint of pink on his cheeks. It makes Renjun’s heart burn.

“Of course.”

“Like _10000000%_ sure?”

“Yes,” Jeno answers.

“No more take backs after this, you better be sure.”

“Yes,” Jeno repeats.

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

“I like you, too, obviously.”

< >

Renjun observes Jeno’s figure—white shirt clinging on to his broad shoulders, the side of his face illuminated by the garish light from his study lamp, eyeglasses sitting beautifully on the bridge of his nose. He almost hasn’t moved at all the past hour, the increasing number of crumpled paper by his feet the cliche and only sign of continued animation in this scene.

In glaring contrast, Renjun’s Pol Sci 114 notebook remains idle and open on the page it has remained on for the past hour, viciously reminding him of its existence, seemingly pointedly staring at him from his folding study table on the floor. He tries his best to ignore it.

When he gets tired of looking at Jeno’s unchanging posture, he grabs the Moomintroll plushie Jeno had bought for him the previous year from beside him and hugs it, returning to mindlessly staring at the ceiling. The plushie sleeps on Jeno's bed as his sort-of replacement when he's not around, he knows, despite the many times Jeno has teased him about it—he’s chosen not to tease him in return—and is one of the many things of his that has invaded this room, becoming part of a space that is distinctly Jeno’s. Like the study stable they had bought for him a couple weeks more after Jeno had moved in at the beginning of the year, much after Renjun had turned Jeno’s room into his own personal library. Much like he has, probably, spending more time here than the current dorm room he shares now with both Donghyuck and Jaemin—an arrangement that brings a chaos in his life that is both unimaginable and all things possibly imaginable. 

Becoming part of this room had happened so naturally, like a certain inevitability they didn’t have much choice with. Jeno’s presence calms him down. The way he works through his tasks with an assertive persistence makes him believe he can do it too, and he’s grown to love the neighborhood, even if it’s a 30-minute walk at most from his dorm, has grown to love holding hands when the streets are empty, which is most times except in the afternoons.

“What are you thinking about?”

It takes him a bit to realize that the question is directed at him, what with Jeno having been acting like he hasn’t been in the room with him the past hour.

He turns his head to where Jeno remains drawing away on his dozens of papers and says, teasingly, “Remember that time when you were extra head over heels for me?”

“Stop daydreaming about me,” Jeno replies, finally switching his attention from whatever he’s doing on his drafting table to Renjun, who, at the moment, is splayed out across his bed.

He laughs, turning to his side so that he’s looking properly at Jeno and digging his chin into his plushie’s crown. “I’m bored. When are you going to finish?”

“Just a little more,” Jeno promises, attention already back to whatever he was doing, and fortunately for him every bone in Renjun’s body is exhausted, lest he’d have strangled Jeno by now because he’s said that exactly _five_ times over the past hour. “You should be studying anyway.”

He ignores the remark. “When did you start liking me?”

“You’re really, _really_ bored.”

“Yes,” he grimaces, eyes already hurting and temples throbbing from staring at his phone too long, left with nothing but Jeno to entertain himself. After spending two weeks basically living with the mantra of _study, work, and drink red bull until you’re dead_ , he feels— _just_ —physically weak to do anything else. “So when did you start liking me?”

“Dunno,” Jeno says, already back to working, after a moment of either contemplation or perhaps just plain spacing out. “Guess I was a bit attracted to you from the start?”

“ _I see_ ,” he teases, “I know I’m quite attractive.”

Jeno’s probably scrunching his nose, grimacing, but Renjun can’t be sure because Jeno’s back to slouching over his drafting table, hands busy with a project Renjun can't really understand.

“I started liking you when you dyed your hair blond, you know.”

“Mm-hmm,” is Jeno’s unenthusiastic reply, maybe a little disappointed and probably already aware of then-blonde Jeno’s impact on the people around him. Crazy times.

“What? You were really attractive.” There’s no reply. “I was pretty sure you were straight, too, so I was just this _tiny bit_ attracted to you and I only ever told Hyuck,” he continues, more to himself. Talking about it now like this makes it seem like the nights he had spent ranting, sometimes also almost crying when he got too emotional—he wore his heart on his sleeve back then, _god_ —to Donghyuck about how much he hates living on this planet and if he could just, _please, stop crushing on Jeno_ had happened in a different dimension. He briefly wonders if there's a him in a different dimension who's just realized his feelings for Jeno, if Jeno even exists in those other dimensions with him. “Anyway, apparently Hyuck straight out asked Nana if you were okay with guys.”

Jeno hums, this time with just a little more interest.

“ _Yes_. Anyway,” Renjun pauses, suddenly thinking about how different things would’ve turned out had Donghyuck told Jaemin and Jaemin told Jeno but it had turned out Jeno didn’t like him. He’s about to get lost in his thoughts when Jeno asks, “Anyway what?”

“Anyway,” he continues, words already lost, “so, yeah, then you went all blonde and, well, _yeah_.”

“... Are you okay? Finally been abducted and taken to Mars?"

Renjun laughs aloud at that. “I’m _soooooooooooooo_ bored, Lee Jeno.”

He smiles, seeing Jeno put down the pencil in his hand. His boyfriend turns to him then, smile on his face betraying the fact that he’s trying hard to look even a little bit annoyed at Renjun’s endless chatter. “Break,” Jeno says.

“Finally,” he replies when Jeno fixes himself beside him, arms wrapping around him and their plushie, ready for his countless stories about whatever things in the world.

_Break_ turns out longer than just a few minutes—it’s been an hour.

By now the glare of his notebook and the papers that are on his study table, the number of re-reads he still has to do, has started to let the panic seethe through his skin, and with it comes a bout of things he would really prefer not to deal with at the moment.

He’s not so sure why he asks it.

Maybe the amount of red bull he had consumed the past two weeks has permanently done something to his brain (it probably had, really). He’s turned way too chatty the past couple of hours.

“Do you ever feel like disappearing?”

It’s the first time he’s asked anyone about it—not exactly a question he can ask just about anyone. Before he can even feel regret for asking, Jeno replies, “ _Hng_? Like, _die_?”

“Um,” he says, lifting his head buried in the other’s chest, “not like _die_ , just… disappear.”

Lips slightly parted, eyebrows knit, Jeno takes up a bit of time to respond. All the while, Renjun's neck begins to sore, so he goes back to placing his head against Jeno’s chest. “Not really... I think,” Jeno eventually replies, pulling him into a tighter hug—the plushie has already been forsaken at the edge of the bed. "What's wrong?"

The buzz of the rusty AC fills their little space, mixing with the dim light coming from the nightlight he had accidentally left a few months ago and has permanently stayed since.

Suddenly he feels like he can’t breathe.

“Just. Sometimes, I–I get really weirdly emotional, you know?” He untangles himself from Jeno, rearranging their bodies so that they’re both looking up at the ceiling, their shoulders brushing, hands now untwined. “Just, sometimes I feel like going on a space shuttle, landing on the moon. Just, forgetting who I am _. Not being me_.”

“Pretty sure KARI won’t let you board one.” The humor in Jeno’s voice is mixed with unease, and, turning to his side to face him, softly, “But will you take me if they let you?”

“Hm,” he hums. It gets a little bit easier to breathe, he thinks, closing his eyes. Just a little bit. “I’ll have to think about it," he teases.

“Did something happen?”

“I don’t know why I took this class as an elective,” he says with an unconvincing laugh, opening his eyes to look at Jeno when there’s no reply and finding a pair of eyes looking so serious, waiting for him to go on.

He can feel Jeno’s breath on his shoulder, his lips hovering its curve.

He sighs.

“I don’t know. My head’s been a mess lately.”

Fingers playing with the hem of his shirt, trying not to feel too much the presence of Jeno’s body next to his.

He feels bare, and it’s not particularly the most pleasant feeling.

“Sometimes I’ll just think, like, what’s the point of everything?”

The other drapes an arm over him, skin and bones hitting his as his figure scoots closer, head fitting perfectly in the dip between Renjun’s neck and shoulder. 

“I mean, I’ve always somehow thought about it, I guess? Even in high school, I think. Maybe. I don’t know. Not like I’m always thinking about it. But. I guess–I think it’s just something that’s always been there. But, like, these days, I really _just_. I think about me, 10 years from now, still having to deal with myself and these feelings—and everything about _me_ ,” he lets out, “and it gets so unbearable sometimes.”

It’s probably the most he’s revealed to anyone ever, and it leaves him with a general feeling of unease. That feeling one gets after saying something they know they’ll never be able to take back. It’s like a big lump of what makes him up had been forcefully taken from him—even though it hadn’t actually been forcibly taken—and now he can only watch as the intruder tries to make sense of it.

Something that made perfect sense to him, somehow.

“I don’t know what to say.” The warm breath against his skin slightly tickles. “‘m sorry.”

“Of course you don’t,” he says with faux exasperation, as if to compensate for the feeling in his chest he wishes to ignore. More sincerely, softly, “You don’t have to say anything.”

Jeno takes his hand and gives it a gentle squeeze. “But I’m here, okay?”

The unease mixes with something tender, and his lungs fill with air.

He smiles and squeezes back.

Untangling their hands, Jeno brings his own to cup his face, turning his head slightly to place a kiss on his lips.

“Let’s go back to studying,” he says when their lips part, laughing when Jeno protests.

< >

By some miracle, and now he’s regretting it a bit, Donghyuck is in his house. His family’s house. In Jilin. It had been a call for celebration then. Now, with Donghyuck hogging all his covers and complaining every other minute about the weather in his hometown, Renjun’s starting to rethink his life decisions.

“If you don’t stop complaining,” he begins, pulling on one of his blankets, “I _swear_ –”

He keeps his eye on the television mounted on the wall, but the movie they’re watching is becoming as much noise to him as it is for Donghyuck, who can’t possibly understand what’s being said as he’s busy playing on his phone rather than reading the subtitles on the screen, which Renjun also has to pay attention to whenever the characters in the movie code-switch from Mandarin to Cantonese. He wills himself to focus on it, and now he’s not sure how much time has passed since the movie had switched from dealing with expired pineapples to cleaning of apartments, the only thing telling him it’s the same movie its gritty gradient and hues. 

His attention doesn’t stay on it too long, though, eyes turning to his phone that’s resting on his chest when it vibrates. 

**jeno:** did u deactivate your insta

“Fine,” Donghyuck concedes. “But the weather here is _seriously_ crazy.”

Renjun kicks him then. Donghyuck probably says something, but, as his attention today has been all over the place, whatever it is he said is thrown into the jumble of noise the movie’s feeding him.

 **me:** yeah  
**me:** i want to #&*! atm  
**me:** why?

 **jeno:** y

 **me:** idk  
**me:** why?

“Are you texting Jeno?”

“What?” he asks. Then, before Donghyuck could reply, when it registers to him what had been asked, “Yeah. Unlike you I'm happily in a relationship.” On normal days this would have been taken as their usual banter, easy and usual. Today, it feels like stretching a rubber band between his fingers, waiting for it to snap.

Donghyuck scoffs in what Renjun would say is actual disgust. “You say that like it’s not thanks to me you two are together.”

 **jeno:** wanted to see ur pics  
**jeno:** post some on katalk

 **me:** ??

 **jeno:** :(

 **me:** (dino emoticon)  
**me:** clingy (nauseated face)  
**me:** no light

 **jeno:** you

 **me:** (neutral face)

 **jeno:** tell auntie  
**jeno:** and hyuck  
**jeno:** i said hi

 **me:** it’s 2 in the morning idiot

 **jeno:** tell auntie i said hi later

 **me:** (thumbs up)

“Jeno says hi.”

A minute or two has probably already passed, but time, like his attention, seems to be sideways today.

“And I’m still mad at you for that.” He hears Donghyuck huff. “What would you have done if Jeno hadn’t actually liked me?”

 **jeno:** u dont miss me?

 **me:** its literally only been a week

 **jeno:** but thats a week gone by without me

 **me:** (crying)

 **jeno:** u dont miss me? :(

 **me:** no

“It was very clear he did, you know.”

He hadn’t even realized Donghyuck hadn’t replied.

“Have you been ruminating again?”

 _Maybe it’s the weather_.

“Maybe I have,” he says, perhaps with a little too much edge in his voice. He’s not sure what he’s trying to achieve, acting out on Donghyuck, but he doesn’t wait for the other to reply, turning back to his phone to find Jeno calling.

Quick on his feet, he’s out of his room in a second, the creak of his door followed closely by Jeno’s voice. “Where’s Hyuck?”

“Room,” he replies, using the light from his phone’s screen to navigate through the dark staircase, Jeno’s view of him nothing but black.

“Where are you?”

“Going downstairs.”

“You’re not scared?”

“Shut up,” he warns, at which Jeno chuckles.

It takes him a little bit longer to go down the stairs, and when he’s finally settled down on a couch, the light in their living room protecting him from all things unknown, Jeno asks, “You really don’t miss me?”

“Literally _why_?”

He eyes his boyfriend through the screen. Jeno’s on his side, cheek resting and arms encircled on a body pillow, watching him intently. What passes through Renjun’s mind, for some reason, is how Jeno’s phone is too close to his face again, and also how he immediately regrets not taking a pillow and a blanket for himself, body already feeling a bit chilly. 

“Missed you suddenly,” his boyfriend mumbles. “You really don’t?”

Renjun doesn’t reply, just stares at him, his own cheek now resting on the couch’s backrest, snuggled to its corners for a little bit of warmth. He’s not exactly sure what to say.

When moments pass and Jeno doesn’t say anything else, he asks, “Does it make you sad?”

“What?”

“That I don’t miss you?”

“A bit.”

“Sorry,” he mumbles, watching the way Jeno’s lips turn up slightly.

“It's okay,” Jeno replies. “I know your baseline.”

Renjun could only roll his eyes, a grin on his face. They don’t exchange any words for a few seconds, just looking at each other through the screen. Being with Jeno is easy, he thinks, and that’s saying a lot, because these days most things are a pain to Renjun.

“So, how’s Jilin?” Jeno asks, breaking the silence they’ve created.

“Cold. My cousins say I should have brought you along."

Jeno grins. "Next time, then,” after a bit adding, “Mom also said you should come over some time.”

“She did?”

Jeno hums in response, looking at him.

“Hm. Okay.”

They fall into another comfortable lull, and it’s not an understatement when he says his head is all over the place, as every time he finds his awareness going back to him, he can’t remember what he had been previously thinking of.

“We’ve been on the call for 15 minutes,” he notes, surprised. Jeno just shrugs lazily, eyes now closed, head still resting on his body pillow. 

“Are you gonna sleep?” Jeno asks, voice a bit hoarse, already sleepy.

“Not yet sleepy,” he replies. “You should sleep.”

“Hm,” Jeno replies but doesn’t make an effort to end the call nor do anything else. “Are you fighting with Hyuck?”

“Yea,” he mutters.

“Why?”

Renjun shrugs, then, when he realizes Jeno can’t see it, mumbles, “My fault I guess.”

“What’d you do?”

“I’ve been so annoyed these days and he was being annoying.”

“So your usual selves?”

“ _Ha ha_ ,” he replies, realizing before he rolled his eyes that Jeno still isn’t looking at him. “I feel a bit bad now.”

“Say you’re sorry, then."

“Do I have to?” he whines and watches as the image on his screen turns black when Jeno unwraps his arms from his body pillow, his body turning and settling comfortably on his bed.

“Yes,” Jeno tells him, his face back on the screen, phone once again held up a little too close to his face. “‘m going to sleep,” he adds.

“K, go to sleep, child.”

“A month doesn’t count.”

“Still older.”

Still, even as Jeno’s eyes begin to close again from drowsiness, he doesn’t move to end the call. Renjun contemplates a bit if he should be the one to end it, but there’s also a part of him that wants the call to last for just a little bit longer, mostly because he’s not ready to face the lingering tension he needs to address when he goes back to his room, but also because he really likes looking at Jeno like this. “We should travel when we turn 30,” he finally says after a while, the thought suddenly just popping up into his mind, adding, “and go to sleep.”

“Okay. We should,” Jeno hums. “Goodnight.”

His phone vibrates a little bit after their phone call ends. He’s still in the living room, just staring at the ceiling to pass off the time.

 **jeno:** feel better soon  
**jeno:** and apologize !  
**jeno:** goodnight

 **me:** (thumbs up)  
**me:** goodnight  
**me:** ily (nauseated face) (face vomiting)

Donghyuck’s still on his phone, playing his stupid game and still hogging all the covers, the telivision already turned off, when he goes back to his room. 

“Done with your lover boy?” his friend asks, eyes not leaving his phone.

Renjun ignores him as he walks to their shared bed, pulling on the covers as he settles himself comfortably under them. “He told me to say sorry,” he says, trying to pass it off as nonchalant, suddenly feeling like an immature child who just got scolded by his parents.

The other doesn’t reply, just reaches over to place his phone down on Renjun’s bedside table and, afterwards, turns to look at him. Renjun feels a lot worse now, knowing he’s been unnecessarily mean the past few days when this was supposed to be a fun holiday for the two of them.

“Sorry,” he pushes out of his lungs, sincere.

Donghyuck hums, and, after a pause, “Do you want to talk about it?”

“Hm.”

Donghyuck moves to grab the television’s remote control, turning it back on. When it does, Renjun’s not entirely sure it’s still the same movie playing and only becomes certain when the woman from earlier reappears, now sporting a flight attendant’s wear. It confuses him a little bit, and there’s an itch to find out exactly what had transpired between the two main characters (or was it four?), but Donghyuck interrupts his thoughts by asking, “So?”

They’re seated side-by-side now, backs against the wall, just like they’ve done a hundred times before, beginning when they were 15—back when Renjun was the new, foreign kid with his broken Korean. Like that time Donghyuck told him about his plans for college, how they should go to the same one, or that time Renjun had come out to him, watching Donghyuck tense up a bit before they were laughing at the boys in their class, afterwards seriously discussing who was the cutest. Renjun stares up at the ceiling, the light from the television bouncing off of it to show murky reds and blues and purples, then white when the credits start to roll.

“I’ll tell you now that I don’t need inspirational shit or whatever,” he finally says, his eyes glued to the television, eyes taking in what for him are unrelated images that had no meaning. He glances to see Donghyuck doing the same.

The channel doesn’t let the credits roll to the end, advertisements already on display just as Donghyuck says, “If you say so.”

“I’m not happy with my major,” he says, again trying to pass it off with fake nonchalance that he’s sure the other doesn’t buy. 

“Okay.”

The two of them don’t say anything more, letting the low murmur of what appears to be an advertisement for cleaning detergents fill up the room. Donghyuck speaks to note how the advertisement doesn’t make sense—it really doesn’t—then, casually, “You do know we only have a year left, right?”

“Obviously,” he replies, trying not to sound annoyed.

Maybe he’s burnt out, he thinks now—enthusiasm all but gone now. He’s tried out all the new things, formed relationships with hundreds of people only to afterwards silently cut them off after realizing the relationship they had was all but shallow.

Having moved out to a different university dorm because Jaemin and Donghyuck had gotten their own places, he can’t even remember when he’d last seen his friends—even more so his other, well, _friends_. It wasn’t like he had missed much, though—he can count on his hands the number of people outside of his family he actually cared about.

“Do you plan to shift out?”

Both of them are watching a new movie now, and Renjun can only wonder why the only Korean channel in their cable keeps playing movies that aren’t in Korean. “Should we switch to Netflix?” he asks first before he replies that _no_ , he doesn’t want to shift out.

Donghyuck passes him the remote. “Then?”

“Nothing.”

“So...”

He shrugs as he scrolls and tries to find a movie that won’t give him a headache and won’t require too much focus, because that was certainly something he had been lacking the entire day. 

“Didn’t you want to be a singer when you were a kid?”

Renjun actually laughs, and maybe that eases the heavy atmosphere in the room, already almost completely dissipating it. “Yeah.”

Donghyuck takes the remote from him when he takes too long to decide, picking a random movie that looks too indie for his current mood. 

“You can still join another club when the semester starts, you know.”

“Music Circle?”

“Or Sing. Whichever.”

Renjun ponders for a moment. “Guess I’ll try that.”

“You should,” Donghyuck says, and that’s the end of their conversation. Partly because Renjun doesn’t want to talk about it anymore, partly because Donghyuck seems to actually be interested in the movie.

He doesn’t really understand it, and nor does he bother to.

**me:** (sleeping face)  
**me:** going to sleep  
**me:** feel a bit better ig  
**me** : hehe  
**me:** goodnight (zzz)

< >

His final year in university passes by fairly quickly compared to the seemingly never-ending days of his third year. There is no time to so much as breathe, insecurities and existential angst things he could only wallow in for a couple of moments before having to move on to dealing with the next set of a hundred deadlines.

The highlight of the whole year would probably be meeting Mark in one of the thousand exhibitions (that time, Jaemin’s) he’d had to attend for credit the past semester. He’s one of those ragged but wise students—delayed, extremely talented, and seemingly connected to and adored by what seems to be everyone in possibly every college and department—constantly performing in their university’s festivals is surely one of the reasons why.

“I think it’ll be better if you place _this_ panel before _this_ one,” Mark tells him as they sit hunched over his drawing tablet. 

It’s almost 10 in the evening, only a little over an hour before the library closes. The unceasing low murmurs and occasional groans of frustration and despair bouncing off the walls and filling the study garden in their university’s central library is enough evidence to tell that mid-sem stress is a recurring theme in every college student’s life, no matter their year level.

He casts his eyes to the sheet opened on his tablet and blankly stares at it, lips pursed. On the corner of his eye, he sees Mark twirling his stylus in one hand, holding the tablet in the other. He’s got half a mind to tell him to _please be careful_.

“You do know it _is_ good, right? Like, this is actually _really_ good, you just need to tweak some things so it makes more sense even to someone who’s not all about those deep stuff, you get what I mean?”

Before he can start to entertain the idea of smashing his drawing tablet against the nearest surface possible because, _no_ , he does not want to tweak things, and he wants to end this semester already, and he just wants to go home to Jilin and not deal with a hundred thousand deadlines, different portfolios for what seems like a million different classes with a hundred thousand demands but—“I am never doing this again,” he says for the millionth time that semester, releasing his breath and clapping his hand together to push himself into motion before grabbing the tablet and pen from the other’s hand. “Anyway, thanks again.”

“It’s cool.” He watches Mark shrug while tugging on the strings of his hoodie. “They do say later on you’ll realize it’s good you went out of your comfort zone, you know?”

“Sure,” he mumbles, making sure to save the file before closing the application.

Mark begins packing his things as well.

“ _Man_ , I’m starving. Should we grab something before we head home or something?”

He hums in response, grabbing his phone from the table to check if he has any unread texts. The last message remains to be Jeno’s short reply of _okay, work hard !_ when he had told him he’d be spending the whole day in the library to work on a piece he’d like to include in his portfolio. “Okay. I’ll grab something for Jeno, too.”

Although they aren’t hiding their relationship, they aren’t exactly the most open about it either. They don’t just suddenly introduce the other as their partner unless explicitly asked, and it’s not like people just look at two guys—especially not here—and say _oh, they’re dating_. Still, maybe Jeno repeatedly briefly checking up on him because they were too busy to meet, sometimes bringing food over, whenever he and Mark, having become proclaimed study/project/college buddies after repeated exposure to and social contact with each other, were working on something for long hours was too much of a telltale. So when Mark had casually asked him, “You guys are dating, right?” he had just breathed in, thought _fuck it, if he’s homophobic, whatever_ , and as casually as he can, had answered, “Yeah.”

“Cool,” the other had replied, then smiled at him teasingly, raising his eyebrows. “Handsome, huh.”

Relief had flooded in his chest then, but he had only grinned and rolled his eyes.

“How’re you getting there?”

“Walking,” he replies, slinging his bag over his shoulders and waiting for Mark to file his notes messily into his bag.

Raising an eyebrow, hands still busy fixing his things, Mark asks, “At this hour? Where’s Jeno?”

“At his apartment, obviously," he replies, sarcastic, just a little bit playful. "Why do you think I’m going there?” 

Suppressing his laugh, shoulders raising in defense, he replies, “Just asking, _god_ , chill.”

  
  
  


The traces of fall are almost gone, replaced by the dry and chilly air of early winter. Keeping his gloved hands deep into his parka, bag of takeout slung on his forearm, he keeps his pace slow. He likes walking at night, even if the stars are hardly visible in this part of the city—or in any part of the city, really. It’s always interesting to think about how different the streets are depending on the time of the day.

Some mornings, when he’d walk the streets on the way back to his dorm after spending the night at Jeno’s, he’d pass by a nearby pet grooming salon to look at animals—mostly dogs—and then just take his time to watch people—mostly old people—go about their day—opening up their shops, walking their pets. It’s weird to think about how vastly different people’s lives are from one another and how he’d never be able to fully know about those lives, never be able to live through any part of them except during those little moments.

The late afternoons bring a large number of crowds, but they mostly cluster near the university streets, where the good portion of food places are. On Fridays he buys churros from an uncle who’s only there from Friday to Sunday. The uncle has grown fond of him a bit, so he lets him take as much chocolate syrup as he wants.

At night, like this one, the streets are mostly empty save the occasional passerby. Nights like this remind him of his hometown. At that time, when his parents had returned to Jilin near the end of high school and he had asked to stay with his aunt and continue his studies here, it had seemed like the right decision. Lately he’s been thinking about the decisions he’s made—the thousand different possibilities of what could have been, what could be. Sometimes he wishes there’s a way for something out there in the universe to tell him he’s made the right decisions—if there are even right and wrong ones.

“It’s okay,” he’d reassure himself out loud. Sometimes he needs to say things out loud. It makes him feel like he believes them.

When he gets to Jeno’s apartment, he finds his boyfriend under the covers, on his phone, watching what he believes are videos of their family’s cats at home. He leaves his boots on the neat little shoe rack by the door, his socks making the floor slippery beneath him. Begrudgingly removing his coat as he tries to place the bag of food carefully next to Jeno’s desk, he walks over to the bed, the other only noticing him then. The moment he does, his arms open wide as if set on automatic, his wide smile contrasting the bags under his eyes. “Hey.”

“Let me change first,” he says, all the while coming into his arms, placing a kiss on the corner of his lips and tripping a bit as Jeno tries to pull him into the bed. He sidesteps over what Jeno calls _organized_ heaps of clutter, grabbing a pair of shorts and a loose t-shirt from the dresser. “What’d you do the whole day?”

A groan he’s not so sure the meaning of comes muffled from under the covers, so when he throws himself onto the bed after he’s done changing, Jeno groaning again beneath him, the feel of the comforter soft and warm against his whole body, he asks again, “Well?”

“Life is hell,” Jeno tells him. Lifting his head to look at Jeno peeking from under the covers, he lets out a puff of air in agreement. “Do you remember that professor I told you about? The one who’s almost bald.”

“Yeah.”

“I am about to set his remaining hair on fire.”

Renjun actually laughs. If he had more energy he would have laughed even harder. Jeno looks pleased with himself. “What’d you bring?”

“Chicken.” He lifts his body slightly to allow Jeno to drape the comforter over the two of them. It feels extremely warm and comfortable under, and he can already feel what little is left of his energy leave his body. 

“I’m almost done with the things I have to do this week.” Jeno maneuvers his body, fixing how their bodies fit into something more comfortable, snaking an arm under him, one hand still holding his phone over his head too closely again, his fingers in the other playing with his fringes. “Did you walk again?”

Eyes closed, he just shrugs and mumbles, “Exercise,” making Jeno chuckle.

As it always does, the silence other than the occasional random noises coming from Jeno’s phone envelopes them, relaxing him. Jeno’s fingers have turned from playing with his fringes to running a familiar, comforting trail on the side of his hips.

“‘m gonna work again. Can you sleep with the lights on?” He doesn’t reply, just pulls Jeno closer. Cuddles after a long, tiring day are a necessity—it's his universal truth. Jeno’s used to this now, obviously. He can picture Jeno smiling as he feels him shift, another arm wrapping around him. “How was today? Did you get a lot done?”

“Drained,” he says against Jeno’s sternum. “I feel like I need a week of not interacting with anyone ever again.”

Like this, safe in Jeno’s arms, with time ticking so slowly, he tries not to think about how his last year in university is almost ending. He tries not to think— _What happens after?_

Jeno chuckles, then, “Just a few weeks left,” and he can’t help but parrot it inside his head. _Just a few weeks left._ The thought didn’t feel so reassuring.

“Just a few weeks left,” he repeats.

Suddenly, weirdly, he feels like going to the moon and taking solely Jeno with him.

Not every day is a bad day, he suddenly thinks, sitting in front of Mark at the fried chicken joint they frequent after their many all-nighters at the university study garden. It suddenly just occurs to him—that he’s been extremely… _normal_ , the past few weeks. Weeks. When he’s in one of his down moods, it just somehow feels like he’s always been that way. Now he can’t even remember what he’s always feeling so shitty about.

“So,” Mark begins, looking at the menu as if they aren’t going to order the exact same thing they order every time they’re here, “we’re graduating. About time, for me.”

“We are,” he concurs, calling over the auntie by the counter.

“You got plans?”

When the auntie finally comes over, giving them her warm, familiar smile, he watches Mark point out the same, exact things he always points out, nodding along as Mark glances at him for affirmation. “Gonna think about it next month,” he answers when they’re alone again, becoming aware mid-sentence that he’s nibbling on the nail of his thumb. “Jeno and some close friends are coming to my hometown.”

“You have other friends?” Mark asks in a tone he’s not so sure is serious or joking. He decides it’s the latter when Mark smiles his annoyingly good-natured goofy smile. He scoffs and squints his eyes, the sides of his lips upturned just a little bit. “Besides Jaemin,” Mark adds, because of course his jokes have to be properly explained.

“Jaemin and I aren’t even that close. He’s like an another friend’s friend friend.” The word _friend_ starts to sound weird to him. 

“Although, yes, he is part of that group," he clarifies, grimacing when he realizes he's just the same as Mark. " _Anyway_ , what are _you_ gonna do?”

“Copywriter at this ad agency. I start next month. And…” Mark says, then loses his train of thought, bringing his index finger to his temple. He raises an eyebrow while Mark raises his other hand to stop him from talking, though he wasn’t even planning to. He looks a bit funny, he wants to say though. “ _Ah_. There’s a spot for a graphic designer. If you’re interested.”

Two baskets of chicken—one sweet garlic soy, another mild chili pepper—arrive just as Renjun’s about to reply, and it’s only then that Mark belatedly asks for a can of diet coke, two glasses of beer, and—“cider,” Renjun supplies.

“And work for large corporations with highly questionable morals?”

“In this economy, you gotta do these things sometimes.” Renjun raises an eyebrow. “Most times.” Mark shrugs, moving the baskets to the center and then grabbing a piece. “And, to make _both_ of us feel better, they’re like socially conscious and stuff.”

Mark’s talking about something regarding the company being closely related to a music label he wants to work with in the future when Renjun suddenly realizes he’s _really_ good friends with Mark. They’ve known each other less than a year, have only usually met up for uni, but he feels more comfortable talking with him like this than he does with all the people he’s known since freshman year. It’s a weird, unnecessary thought, and it makes him impulsively reply with, “You should come to Jilin, too,” adding, “in the future, I mean,” when he realizes he absolutely, definitely sounded off-center.

He mirrors the way Mark scrunches his nose, eyebrows furrowed, a confused, delighted grin on his lips.

“Alright. Sure. Cool. Sure.”

The snow starts falling again. 

From beside him, Jeno yells out for Jaemin and Donghyuck to be careful. They continue moving in circles on their bikes—technically his and one of his cousin’s bikes, but they’ve all been using them the past three days that they’re like communal property by now—ignoring how slippery the pavement veiled with a thin layer of snow is.

He just watches them, watches how they move against the backdrop of warm lights and darkness, some of its space filled by falling snow. A noise from a group of people somewhere beyond where he can see disrupts the stillness of his friends' repeated circles, momentarily cutting their laughs off from him.

He suddenly feels a sense of longing—for what he’s not exactly sure.

“Hey,” Jeno says, breaking his rather pensive mood.

“Hm?”

Jeno doesn’t reply.

Jaemin and Donghyuck have gotten off their bikes now, leaving them to lie down and lean against the pavement. The night is too peaceful for him to call them out. He watches them walk away from where they are, clueless to where they’re going.

At this moment, he feels like he’s here.

Like, somehow, the world has been cut off and he’s _here_. 

The day after the end of his last semester, the sensibility he had seemed to have inhibited had just suddenly, abruptly returned. He had already moved out of his dormitory by then, classes already done, spending his remaining days of being a college student with the aunt his family had lived with during his freshman year in high school after his dad’s sudden transfer. Like a switch, it had just turned from off to on. It had just suddenly struck him: this is it, it’s a beginning to _something_. 

At this point, he can see Jaemin and Donghyuck circle around and walk back towards them. He jumps a little out of his seat when Jeno snakes his bare hands to the inside of his coat’s pocket, feeling through the cashmere how Jeno struggles to intertwine their fingers. “Do you want to move in together?”

His heart pounds against his ribcage, and he feels himself getting pulled back, like he’s part of the world again.

“Not immediately, I mean, if you _are_ staying–maybe–”

Jeno grounds him. 

When he gets too up in his head, Jeno holds his hands, reminds him that he’s here.

Right now, he’s here. Beside him. In this park with its soft orange lights and snow-covered pavement. He’s here, Jeno’s hand against his covered skin warm. 

“Okay.”

There’s nothing else to say, so he just lets the night fill the spaces between them his words can’t ever do. 

“Okay.”

< >

The architecture building’s exhibit hall buzzes with an energy that reminds Renjun of a similar scene he had played part of just a couple months ago, of the moving poster that showcased some of his favorite spatial concepts found in the streets of Seoul he had made for his final art exhibit. Someone taps him by the arm as he’s looking at what appears to be a model for a strangely-shaped museum dome, and he turns around to find Donghyuck before him.

“I got here as soon as I could.”

He raises an eyebrow. “I haven’t even said anything.”

Donghyuck shrugs his shoulders in retaliation and throws a glance at the displayed model he had just been looking at before asking, “Good to see you back, too. Anyway, where’s Jeno’s?”

He navigates them through the hall, having already familiarized himself with it as he had been with Jeno since the beginning of the afternoon. It was almost 5. Donghyuck follows beside him, all the while telling him about how he’s finally become part of the writing team for the new segment in his network’s midnight program—he tries to think back on the last episode he had watched, but the memory is blurry, so he keeps his mouth shut.

The difference in his and everyone else’s lifestyles had caught him off-guard at the start, but by now it’s like the world has aligned itself again. Although they haven’t been talking that much the past year anyway—and it’s not like he even talks with everyone else that much—not with Donghyuck’s thesis and his design portfolio, it had still felt weird when he had realized that, even though he had been a hundred miles away, he couldn’t just message any of his friends in the middle of the day, that they were dealing with things that seemed greater than all the bundles of emotions inside him—actual, tangible stressors—he’d be lying if he says it hadn’t been unpleasant.

Now, though, with the increasing pressure to find employment (from himself rather than his family, if he’s being honest), he feels a bit better—this is a feeling he can deal with, something that’s easy to understand, a situation that has detailed blueprints—for once he keeps the overwhelming existence of a hundred different ones away, tries to ignore the little fires in his core set by fears of never doing something even a bit significant to the world. Sometimes he wonders if his life would be just a bit satisfying if he had followed Donghyuck’s advice and had applied for a performing org, at least getting a feel of his childhood dreams.

“It’s probably going to be better when I get a job,” he had told Jeno over a video call when the latter had asked him how he was coping with the amount of time he has, in contrast to his lack of it because of his 5th year workload. “And maybe I’ll apply for that thing Mark told me about.”

 _It’s okay_ , he reminds himself. It’ll be okay.

Jeno has a small audience when he comes into their view. Some of his professors, perhaps. Corners of his lips upturned without baring his teeth, eyes wide and focused. He looks really mature and attractive standing like that, he couldn’t help but think. It makes his stomach flutter. Their relationship has become one of comfort, but from time to time he'd look at Jeno and feel heat spread through his entire body. He wonders if Jeno feels the same.

Turning to Donghyuck, he tells him they should wait a bit, moving to stand in a corner, next to what seems like an elaborate plan for urban regeneration. “You should have brought your girlfriend along,” he says, eyes still on the incomprehensible display in front of him. Donghyuck’s current, and probably most serious, relationship is also one of the reasons they haven’t talked much, but he can’t really blame him—he was the same at the beginning of his and Jeno’s relationship, and they're grownups now, or at least they’re trying to be, busy with their own lives.

Donghyuck nudges him with his elbow. He turns around and sees that the audience has finally left. “She’s coming later,” Donghyuck replies offhandedly, already heading to where Jeno’s standing.

He casts one last glance at the poster, having stopped mid-sentence, turns his heel, and follows Donghyuck’s lead.

Standing outside, clothes smelling like grilled meat, he makes small talk with Donghyuck’s girlfriend, waiting for their respective boyfriends—it’s a weird way to think of it, he realizes belatedly—as Jeno says goodbye to his blockmates and Donghyuck checks the main street for the taxi they’ve hailed.

He holds back a sigh of relief when Jeno finally steps out and joins them. He doesn’t say much to contribute to the conversation, but his presence is greatly appreciated—Renjun is running out of things to say. He’s unable to help the smile of relief from breaking out when Donghyuck finally calls them over.

They walk to where Donghyuck is, and, when the driver honks at them, all hurriedly cross the street.

“See you next year,” Donghyuck jokes— _you mean next lifetime, right,_ Renjun quips—and, before finally reaching the car, sincerely, “Congrats, Jen.”

“Thanks. And thanks for taking time off your busy schedule.”

“Don’t forget us when you’re finally on TV,” Renjun continues, a bit breathless from the running, digestive tract definitely not thankful for that sudden bout of physical activity.

As Donghyuck curses them off before finally getting in, Jiyeon waves a goodbye at them from the other side. 

“Should we go home?” Jeno finally asks him when the car is out of their sight. Renjun turns to him, takes in how gorgeous he looks in his pink beige dress shirt with his blonde hair and undercut—Jeno has already complained about how much he won’t shut up about it—and smiles at him unapologetically when the other squints his eyes and scrunches his nose at him because he’s sure he knows what he’s thinking.

“Okay,” he replies, already walking ahead of him. 

They walk leisurely in silence, choosing a longer route with less people, every now and then bringing up something that had happened during the week or some other thing about which and which. His skin feels sticky from the lingering heat and smells, and summer is just around the corner, so the increasing humidity in the air is not the least uncomfortable. Still, when, at one point, Jeno holds his hand, his other hand holding his messenger bag over his shoulder, he doesn’t let go.

He steals a glance at him, and the man beside him shows almost no traces of the Jeno from a few days ago—restless, withdrawn, even passive-aggressive. He holds his hand tightly, speaking in the language Jeno’s comfortable with—because Jeno shows him he loves him through his touches—hands on his waist, smoothing circles on his skin, kisses on his jaw. 

He wants to tell him he’s immensely proud of him, but they’ve both never been that good with words, so instead he turns to him and asks, in a language Jeno knows, loves, much not like him, “Do you want to go jog tomorrow?” supplying, “or we can go bike, or maybe even ‘ _hit the gym_ ,’ if you want,” when Jeno, surprised, lets go of his hand and turns his body to him.

“ _Why?_ ”

He clicks his tongue at Jeno’s disbelief, moving to take his hands in his again. “Because I want to celebrate, just us two.”

Jeno’s disbelieving face slowly breaks into a smile, and his boyfriend moves to take him into a hug. He steps back, jokingly saying something about waiting to get home and taking a shower first, but Jeno pulls that exaggerated pout he does so rarely—they’re probably both slightly cringing on the inside—so, just like Jeno has done for him a hundred of times in their relationship, he pulls him close, allowing him to find some form of comfort in his arms.

< >

One thing Renjun learns when he’s 24: life definitely does not get easier.

He wakes up every day, and the only thing he can think about is whether every day’s going to be this way: waking up, going to work, going back home. He wonders if everyone feels the same, but then he looks at Jeno—just, well… _Jeno_ —going through life one step at a time, living in the moment—and he’s not so sure what to feel.

It’s a bitter feeling—not to be fully happy for someone he loves.

It isn’t that he hates his job.

Contrary to what he had been expecting, the anxiety-induced sleepless nights before his first day seeming like a fever dream now, his workplace is actually pretty great—save the times their clients seem to believe advertisements take up just an hour to magically whisk up and ask for a million revisions—and those revisions, _god_.

He doesn’t hate his job, really, but he can’t help but feel that he’s wasting his time. The hours pass by slowly, but also as if they’re in a hurry to run out, and Renjun’s not so sure where to stand between those two extremes, his frustration snowballing into itself from one day to the next. Before he knows it, he’s on the train, feeling like he’s wasted yet another day in his life doing something so pointless to him. Sometimes he can’t help but think he has a hollow core—a pit, maybe.

He forgets that sometimes, but it’s always just there.

The first thing he sees when he opens his eyes is the red glare of their digital clock, the digits _05:30_ reminding him he needs to get up and deal with another 24 hours of being alive. 

Untangling Jeno’s arms from around him, he reaches for his phone to snooze the alarm. He moves to lie on his back, still, Jeno’s tranquil breathing the only sound he can hear. There’s no trace of light in their room yet. Renjun hopes the world can stop for a bit, for the sun to not rise today. But, of course, that’s not possible, so he forces himself to get up, breathes, and turns to the man sleeping beside him. “Jen, wake up. You’ll be late.”

Jeno grunts, arms encircling around his waist and pulling him closer. He runs his fingers through his hair, softly repeating that it’s time to wake up. It takes a little bit more persuasion, which includes some tugging on his hair, for him to let go, his sturdy arms holding on to him quite tightly for someone who is asleep.

He gets up, heads out of their room.

Their apartment isn’t that big: a cramped bedroom (the bed remains to be Jeno's twin bed from university), a little kitchenette with all the essentials, a bathroom, beside which is a small space for a washing machine and a drying rack so they can save up on laundry bills. The only place in their little home that can be considered a little bit spacious is the living room, two of its corners designated as each of their workstations, since most times they need to bring unfinished work home—better than doing overtime at their companies. The small television in the middle of the room (they don't even use it, really), along with an also small couch and an even smaller table in front of it, are the only items that can actually be considered a luxury.

His steps are lazy, body still sluggish from sleep, as he proceeds to the fridge.

It's Friday, and the previous day hadn’t been too draining, so he decides to prepare something simple for them. They usually just buy bread or whatever they can find in the subway station—sometimes they don’t even bother with breakfast—but, when he isn’t feeling a little too tired or despondent, he takes it to himself that they eat a proper meal.

As he moves about preparing breakfast, he hears the door to their bedroom open and the sound of feet getting dragged against the wooden flooring. He feels a light kiss on his neck, just beside his earlobe, along with a sluggish _morning, cooking?_ and a pair of arms around his waist. They stay like that for a moment, Jeno lazily resting his whole body against his before he pulls himself away and once again drags his feet to the bathroom, eventually turning the shower on.

He goes about the kitchen, humming a song he’s not quite sure the title of. The broth boils, the rice simmers, the morning continues.

Just as he’s about to finish preparing, Jeno comes back out to the living room, drying his hair with a towel. He’s already dressed, and the corners of his sleeves crease as he moves toward him. Renjun internally recoils as he watches some drops of water seep into the fabric. “Go shower. I’ll prepare the table.”

He goes back to their bedroom, not before making sure to remind Jeno to dry his dress shirt, gets the clothes he’ll be wearing for the day, then heads to the bathroom.

It’s all pretty much routine now.

“What time are you getting out later?”

“Maybe a little after seven,” he says, mouth full of rice. Jeno chides him for talking while his mouth is full; he glares at him because he’s doing the same thing. “I’m clocking in a bit later since I still need to finish something before I go to work."

“Okay.” Jeno’s done with his meal, drinking his second glass of water and watching him as he continues eating. “Meet you there?”

“Can I go to you first? Don’t wanna wait alone.”

“You sure?”

He nods his head, cleaning his plate for any leftovers. Adulthood—even if they’re only 24—has finally taught him the value of food he had worked hard to buy himself.

“Okay.” Jeno tells him, standing up and taking both of their bowls along with the other saucers to the sink. 

He looks at his phone. 06:50. “I’ll wash them. You’re gonna be late.”

Jeno reaches for his own phone to look at the time. “See you tonight,” giving him a peck on the lips afterwards, reminding Renjun to drink water and, “Make sure to wear your thick coat.”

“Hm,” he hums, still seated at their little dining table, watching as Jeno shuffles across the room to grab his bag and coat and afterwards hover by their door to put on his shoes. 

“Have fun at work,” Jeno tells him before he leaves.

“You too.”

There’s always that sort of premonition, really. Some unpleasant feeling when something bad’s about to happen.

Perhaps he’s always been waiting for this, Renjun thinks, standing outside Jeno’s building. The cold breeze brought about by January hits his face harshly, his cheeks and lips feeling like they’re dead skin just waiting to be peeled off. He waits for Jeno to finish with his goodbyes, quietly looking at his boyfriend animatedly converse with his officemates. He’s much more relaxed now. He remembers how Jeno used to look so stiff interacting with his officemates and how stressed he had been about it, thinking that he was too unapproachable (he probably was).

There’s that bitter feeling again.

The building stands quite far from the main highway, so it isn’t an exaggeration when Renjun says it’s eerily quiet where he’s standing. He stands there awkwardly, eyes on Jeno, trying his best to ignore the looks the new, unfamiliar guard manning the building is giving him—eyes keeping still on Jeno to prove that he _is_ indeed waiting for someone.

It’s unpleasant, he thinks. The bitter feeling grips his whole body, his insides turning upside down when Jeno spots him and sends him a smile—the only thing he can think about is how badly he wants to vomit. He forces a smile back, taking out his hand from his pocket to give a small wave. He commands his brain to listen to him for once, _please_ , asking it to push the unpleasant feeling—whatever it is—away from him; somehow, no matter how silly it may sound, he feels it’ll spread and turn Jeno bitter, too.

“How long have you been here?” Jeno asks him after he finishes with his niceties and rushes outside to meet him.

“Just got here.”

As they walk, already a distance away from the building, Jeno makes a move to grab his hand, the both of them looking surprised when Renjun flinches and pulls his hand back. “My hand’s cold,” he says immediately. It’s not entirely a lie. 

“It’s okay,” Jeno says, grabbing it again and interlocking their fingers.

Renjun can only hope the bitterness doesn’t slip through his skin.

Perhaps Jeno’s been too good to him, he concludes, his lover’s hand in one of his as they walk to the train station. Jeno’s been so good to him that he’s somehow forgotten that he has a pit deep within him. 

“What's wrong?”

“Hm? Nothing,” he lies. He’s not sure when he started lying to Jeno.

“How was work today?”

“Still the same,” he replies, adding, “You looked like you were having fun.”

“Yeah, I got assigned to work on something I’ve been wanting to try since uni.” Jeno beams at him, and Renjun feels thankful that he does feel happy for Jeno. He does. And he’s scared, because what if one day he really isn’t? It’s an unbearably unpleasant feeling, and he can only pray that it’s a feeling that goes away with time.

“That sounds great.”

Jeno probably notices that he isn’t as enthusiastic as he’s trying to pretend he is, because before they reach a busy road, he slows their steps, their intertwined fingers pulling Renjun back. “Are you sure nothing's wrong?”

Now they’ve completely stopped walking. Renjun watches as someone throws them a glance before bypassing them. Jeno doesn’t look like he’s about to move unless he does something, his face holding that gentle but determined look of his, so Renjun tugs their hands.“It’s just the usual.” There’s a budding feeling of guilt in his gut. Jeno’s supposed to be celebrating. And it’s finally their Friday night. The bitterness and guilt dance together in his stomach, and the feeling of nausea from earlier comes back. “It’s just the usual, okay?”

“If you’re unhappy, you should look for another job, okay? I can probably support the two of us for a couple of months if that’s what you’re worried about.”

He brings his free hand to Jeno’s face. The cold makes both of them wince. “It’s okay,” he repeats, trying to assure the both of them, thumb caressing Jeno’s cheek. “It’s just the winter.”

Jeno takes the hand on his cheek in his, their other hand still intertwined. He places a kiss on his birthmark, the one on his hand. Once, when they were still just friends—what a weird thought it is now, that they had just been that once—Jeno had thought it was a bruise, looking at it repeatedly until Renjun had told him what it was. Another time, when they were already what they are now, he had watched Jeno trace its blurry outlines, placing a kiss on it, just as he's doing now. Different, the same. He's not so sure anymore. “Okay, but, _please_ , you know you can tell me anything, right? I won’t understand if you don’t tell me.”

He gives him what he hopes is a reassuring smile, not waiting for how the other reacts, tugging their hands so they start walking again.

Sometimes it still surprises him that for someone who doesn’t say much about what he’s feeling, Jeno cares a lot about knowing how Renjun feels. Sometimes it surprises him, sometimes burdens him. Tonight, it gives him a warm feeling.

A warm feeling that reminds him that the bitter feeling he also feels has more to do with Renjun than it does with Jeno.

See, this hollowness in Renjun's heart—at times he feels it consume him—all of him—and he feels himself turning black, as if he's just a few shades close to becoming nothing.

He's said it a million times to the people he cares about. He's said it a million times that at this point he wonders what the point of saying it is. Nothing ever changes. The feelings of emptiness somehow get filled up one way or another, until it comes again. At 24, he can only ever wonder when it’ll permanently swallow him whole.

There are good days, sure, but he looks at himself and he can't help but think: _this is how I've always been, and this is probably how I'll always be_.

< >

He hates eating alone, but it’s okay.

It’s okay, he thinks, sitting on the floor in front of their small table, food in front of him looking bland. He grabs his tablet from his bag, fixes it beside his food, and opens the website the new TV program Donghyuck’s involved in can be streamed on. It’s a food travel show featuring a couple of big name actors, and Donghyuck usually assists on-site, which is why he’s only seen his friend maybe twice in over a year.

He continues eating.

Fridays have become too swamped with deadlines and work-related social gatherings. Weekends are sometimes spent doing something that doesn’t involve Jeno, nor him with the other. Every day is just him feeling like everyone else is slowly moving forward while he’s still here. Still him.

“It’s fine,” he says out loud once he’s done eating, putting the takeout boxes back in the bag and leaving it next to the trash can.

He settles himself into the couch, grabbing one of the Moomintroll plushies to hug it, drawing his limbs to his torso so he can fit. It’s almost midnight when he finishes watching the episodes he’d missed. The silence after the show ends further deepens the general malaise he feels, and Jeno’s still not home. He stays on the couch for a little while more, transferring only to the empty bed when his back begins to hurt. As if on cue, an overwhelming cascade of things begin to run through his mind, and a small part of him wants to message Mark or Donghyuck or maybe even Jaemin, but then there’s a limit to how much a person can say the same things over and over again before they start tiring someone out, so instead he breathes, turns to his side, and tells himself, _It’s okay. Not every day’s a bad day._

Not every day is a bad day, he reminds himself as he lies in their bed. He looks at their bedside clock.

01:27.

He groans a bit, having been woken up from his light slumber by the sound of someone moving about just outside the room. A few minutes later, he hears the door creak. Jeno continues moving about the room. Staying still, Renjun waits for him to finish. After a while, he feels the space beside him dip, arms sauntering around his waist, breath tickling the back of his neck.

"Did you wait for me again?" Jeno whispers against his skin once he's found a comfortable position.

Renjun hums and brings their bodies closer. "Hard to sleep without you," he whispers back.

He feels Jeno shift his body; then, a pair of lips on the side of his neck. "Sorry about today." He feels the small, soft kisses on his skin, the hands still wrapped around his body. "What time did you get home?"

He turns his body to Jeno, grabbing his hand that isn't under his weight and placing it so that he's cupping his jaw. Jeno hums in understanding, his thumb beginning to move in small circles to caress his cheek. "Around 10," he mumbles, trying his best to reply, feeling his consciousness already slipping away; just the comfort of Jeno's warmth already a lullaby.

“Okay. Go back to sleep.”

They stay like that—for how long, he’s not sure—his consciousness seemingly coming and going. “What’s wrong?” he asks, voice laced with sleep, remembering how tired Jeno had sounded when he had called to cancel their dinner plans. 

“Rough day.” Jeno’s breath hits his lips when he whispers. Their voices sound so loud to him, even as he drifts away to sleep. It’s a quiet night. Their voices are the only sounds he can hear. 

_Is there anything I can do?_ He’s not so sure he said it aloud, like one of those moments that, when he wakes up, he begins to wonder as actually happening in a dream or not. Even Jeno’s reply is hazy. Hazy, soft. “Go to sleep and just let me hold you like this, hm?”

“Okay,” he whispers, before sleep can fully whisk him away.

As he falls deeper into sleep, he feels Jeno tuck his head under his chin, hands moving down to rub comforting circles on his back. Like this, he falls asleep easily.

It’s okay, he thinks. This is okay.

Today’s a particularly bad day. The moment he woke up he knew it was going to be a bad day. A feeling of irritability has planted its way all over his being—the sound of the advertisements in the train had sounded too loud, the walk to his office had seemed unusually long, the sunlight as he walked had shone too brightly.

He watches over his desktop as Mark approaches his workspace, the latter with his silly smile on. Mark catches him looking and doesn’t break the eye contact, his silly smile appearing to widen as he comes closer. Renjun continues staring back, waiting.

This particular level in their office building looks like one big IKEA showroom, the floor divided into multiple areas with different themes, color schemes, and lighting strategically used to bring about what science would say is the perfect mood that would allow creative thinkers in the CS Department to work in top shape. The point is—what he’s trying to say is—that it’s a really great workplace. Still, with the unexplainable irritation he is feeling, the only thing he could think of is that he’d rather be in bed, under his covers, away from this damned perfect office.

Mark passes by the LED TV plastered on the wall on one side of the room, the advertisement playing one Renjun was involved in creating. The irritation inside him itches.

It seems to take much longer than it actually does for Mark to finally get to where he is. When he does, he grabs the swivel chair from the table in front of Renjun’s and dramatically turns it before settling in.

“So,” Mark says, finally beside him.

He raises his eyebrows, turns his face just a little bit to acknowledge his presence.

“They bought the song. And I’ve been added to, like, their exclusive list of songwriters/producers thing.”

He fully turns to Mark, and Mark knows him well enough to shield his upper arm from his frantic, excited palm. The huge smile on his face is a hundred percent genuine, his mood already better. “You’re finally leaving me alone.”

Mark laughs. “Don’t worry, definitely not going anywhere. Life ain’t that fair.”

He sighs in agreement, turning his chair back to his screen. When Mark lingers next to him, he turns to him again, raising an eyebrow. “We’re both broke. I’m not paying for your meal.”

“So, _well_ , I saw Jeno this morning. When I went to buy coffee after the meeting. Guess it was near his workplace.” He raises his eyebrow even higher, because the other’s tone suggests there’s something more to his anecdote. “I might have slipped that you want to quit. _Uhm_ , he looked a bit surprised?”

He stares at his friend, dumbfounded.

He’s a friend, he repeats in his mind. He’s a friend, and he doesn’t deserve to be asphyxiated right then and there. Maybe after their celebratory dinner.

“Sorry.” He continues staring. “I didn’t realize you still aren’t talking to him–I mean, you know what I mean.”

“I _am_ ,” he replies, defensive. _He is._ “Just–Just not about those things.”

This time, pursing his lips, Mark’s the one who raises an eyebrow.

He tries to think up ways on how to immediately end this conversation but comes up blank. The universe has conspired against him today. Releasing a defeated sigh, he replies, “I mean, what should I say, okay? The same things I’ve told him a million times? I just want to stop being—”

He stops himself.

“What?”

 _Pathetic_ , he thinks but doesn’t say aloud. “I just don’t want to tire him out. He’s got a lot of things going on right now.”

The look on Mark’s face makes him feel like he’s being scrutinized, and, whatever his intentions are, it makes him feel terrible. Sometimes he feels regret for baring himself to people, for showing them parts of himself that are too vulnerable, and he wishes he can just disappear from people’s memories like— _poof_ . He averts his gaze. The irritation comes back, and it sounds a bit pointed when he lets out, “It’s just something I need to deal with on my own _._ ”

“Oh. Yeah. I know. Sorry.”

He’s not sure how the other looks as he says that, busy trying to look preoccupied with the blank sheet on his desktop.

They stay there, silent. Now there’s guilt as well, and he curses a person’s ability to feel such conflicting emotions.

“No.” He sighs—his hundredth today. “It’s not your fault. I–Uh–This is awkward.” Another sigh. “Uhm,” he continues, turning to Mark, “can we talk about something else?”

Mark looks at him; then, with an understanding nod, cracks a small smile. “I’m paying later?”

He returns the smile, faking offense when he replies, “Obviously.”

The subway’s pale colors—the overlaying tints of faded green and blue, the sickly white of the lights and walls—mixed with the muted energy of the usual busy Thursday crowd contradicts greatly with the flamboyant Samsung advertisement featuring an idol duo named CHENJI currently displayed on multiple digital screens plastered beside the glass walls of the train doors. He watches the same set of advertisements replay over and over again on the others—one for a new flavor of a popular drink, another for a TV drama that’s about to air, one more for a different brand of drink, several for cosmetic products.

It’s just another, usual day.

The glass doors finally make way for the tired crowd that only wants to get home already, and Renjun’s heavy feet are already familiar with the steps they need to take, his hand already grabbing for the pole to steady himself as the train abruptly starts moving.

His focus shifts constantly from the rapidly moving walls outside to the song blasting from his airpods to his reflection on the tinted screen door.

Eyebrows just slightly arched, eyes unblinking, teeth biting his lower lip so that it’s somewhat jutting out to the side.

He can already picture Jeno’s disappointed face.

Getting annoyed at each other is not too uncommon; they live together—getting annoyed at a person occupying the same cramped space is as set in stone as other beings existing in this vast universe.

Still, they rarely ever really fight. 

But again, they live together, so, when they do, it’s hell.

Having to look at and breathe the same air as the other, and, most of all, share one bed—the couch is _not_ livable, and both of them care too much about sleeping comfortably—when they can’t stand each other is some form of sadomasochistic play they both do not want to partake in. But Donghyuck lives an hour away, Mark has a roommate, and Jeno would rather suffer from such sadomasochism than share a room with any other living being.

The longest fight they’ve had since they started living together lasted three days. Jeno had acted like he didn’t exist; Renjun had done the same, although he’d assume it had been harder for him—Jeno _is_ 5’10, makes weirdly adorable noises when he’s concentrating, and has an alarm that rings too loudly and is turned off too slowly in the mornings.

He’s lost count how many songs he’s listened to when he arrives at his stop. He lets the others alight first, and his footsteps are laboriously slow as he goes through the tiresome escalators, passages, and roads to their apartment.

The dull-colored low-rise building comes into view, and Renjun finds himself sighing instinctively. He bows his head to the older man manning the building, heads inside, conquers the stairs, and stands for quite a long while outside the narrow hallway, finger hovering over their door’s electronic lock. Breathing in, he punches in _0023_ and twists the door handle.

Neck lying comfortably on a pillow against one of the couch’s arms, Jeno looks up from his phone, stares at him a bit before allowing himself to smile, and lifts his free arm slightly to welcome him. Renjun goes through the routine of removing his shoes, grabbing his airpods’ case from his pocket and securing them, and leaving his bag on the table—this time with a trip to their newly bought mini-ref for the takeout Mark had bribed him for forgiveness with—before placing a kiss on his boyfriend’s lips.

“Hi.”

“Hey. Welcome home.”

Jeno’s still in his work clothes, his messenger bag on the floor, eyeglasses on the table. He lifts the other’s legs and settles them on his lap as he takes a seat. They stay like that for quite a bit—Renjun with his back against the couch, eyes closed, Jeno back to mindlessly scrolling through his phone.

When Jeno doesn’t make any indication that he’s about to address his morning encounter with Mark, he turns his head to the side, opens his eyes and looks at Jeno, who notices and stares back, raising his eyebrows in question.

“I’m not quitting.”

Jeno avoids conflict like it’s second nature, avoids them until he bursts. Staring at him, eyes unblinking, already biting his lower lip. Jeno avoids conflict until he bursts, but Renjun knows him well.

He breathes in and sits up straight. “I just mentioned it in passing.”

Jeno shrugs, returns to staring at his phone. “Okay.”

He continues looking at him. Calmly, he prods, “Stop pretending you aren’t mad.”

“I’m not.”

He lets the atmosphere settle until it starts suffocating him, until frustration builds up in his gut. Voice still barely above a whisper, he comes out with, “ _You_ told me I should quit my job.”

Jeno finally looks at him, lowering his phone and telling him in a somewhat leveled voice, “I told you that because you’re unhappy.”

“ _I’m not unhappy_ ,” he argues, once again defensive, voice rising considerably higher. The frustration borders what’s probably unjustified anger now, and he can’t help but think: he’s sure he has hundreds of good days but why is it that the only ones that stand out are those that aren’t?

“This isn’t what this is about,” the other says, sighing.

“ _Then what is it about again?_ ”

“Renjun.” Jeno rarely calls him by that name. Removing his legs from his lap, Jeno moves to properly sit and lean his back against the couch’s backrest, grip on his phone tight. “How do you think it made me feel when I didn’t even know what Mark was talking about? I don’t even know what you’re thinking about anymore.”

The exhaustion mingling with his frustration seeps through every inch of his body, so the question comes out bitter, “When was the last time you even had dinner with me, Jeno?” It’s not really supposed to come out as bad as it does, because he knows Jeno’s busy, knows Jeno’s doing things that are important to him.

Guilt, again.

“I told you work’s pretty hectic right now,” Jeno lets out, turning to him. Jeno takes his hands in his. The back of his phone feels hot against his skin.

“I know,” he whispers, then, louder, “And I know you’re stressed. That’s why I didn’t say anything.”

“You’re still my boyfriend, Jun. Stop treating me like an outsider, _please_. I told you, I won’t understand what you want unless you tell me.”

“You don’t–” He wants to bite back with how hypocritical Jeno sounds, but stops himself—reminds himself that this time it _is_ on him. Sincerely, tiredly, he tells him, “We're both tired. _Just_. I’m sorry, okay? Let’s go to sleep.”

Jeno stares at him. Eyebrows just slightly arched, eyes unblinking, teeth biting his lower lip so that it’s somewhat jutting out to the side.

“I don’t want to fight,” he repeats, gently. “Please, let’s just go to sleep.”

Jeno releases a defeated sigh. Renjun thinks about how many times they’ve gone to sleep like this.

“We’re okay, right?”

"Let's sleep," is Jeno's only reply.

< >

Still, at 26, nothing's easy. And, inevitably, things fall apart, life catches up, and he just lets it.

He almost lets out a sigh of relief when everything begins to come apart at the seams. It’s as if he can finally stop waiting for _something_ to happen, just as he’s sure he’s been doing the past two years. It’s like they both just suddenly, simultaneously decided to stand aside and watch their relationship fall apart together.

It’s obvious in how they are right now, both too tired and weary to even fight. Too tired and weary to fight—the past few weeks just seemingly having turned into a never-ending competition of who can disappoint the other more—so they just lie with their backs against each other, the little distance between them feeling like a huge rift but also like they’re still too close to the edges.

There wasn’t even any drastic change, really. If Donghyuck or Mark or Jaemin had looked at them, they’d probably see the same dynamic only people who have been in a relationship as long as theirs have—a quiet understanding of each other, a secure and comforting lack of need to be physically close together—that even if they are at opposite ends of a room, anyone who looked closely would be able to tell that they were together—just in the way they’d talk, look, move.

There wasn’t any drastic change, but Renjun is too perceptive and sensitive for his own good, and Jeno is too wary of actual, irreversible conflict.

And there's just something worse about not actually fighting.

Even if harsh words aren’t exchanged, even if voices aren’t raised, he feels it. The way Jeno’s hands don’t linger, the amount of time Jeno spends staying the night at work.

At this point he’s not entirely sure who’s avoiding who.

Time apart is normal, comforting even. But he’s not used to time spent apart feeling more like a statement, an acknowledgement to something that’s going on between them that they both do not want to acknowledge, instead of something that has always been.

He lies wide awake, the anger he feels in his chest too intense. Still, from time to time the anger is replaced with the desire to turn around, pull Jeno close, and tell him he’s sorry—even if it’s not entirely his fault, really—and that everything’s fine—whatever this is okay. 

“Are you awake?”

The question doesn’t come from him, and his heart almost drops as the edges blur and Jeno’s arms wrap around his waist, forehead pressing against the back of his neck. Everything fades away instantly—the question of why they were even fighting forgotten, placed in a box of things they have yet but greatly need to address.

He takes Jeno’s hands in his and holds them firmly.

Jeno’s lips are dry against his skin.

Renjun wonders if it's possible to just remain here, like this.

“We should break up.”

Jeno keeps his feelings in until he can’t and he bursts, just as he does now.

“ _What?_ ”

They stare at each other, and a rush of feelings pass through both of them, judging by the way Jeno looks lost for a bit before he’s closing the door angrily behind him, steps heavy as he walks past around him and into their bedroom.

He follows him, steps meaningful and just as heavy, and watches as Jeno rummages through their drawer, hands busy with whatever they can find themselves on—messily and mindlessly looking for something, _anything_.

“What the hell do you mean?” he demands, eyes already starting to sting.

Jeno ignores him and continues doing whatever the hell he’s supposed to be doing, until Renjun’s stomping his way to him and forcefully turning him around. There are tears in Jeno’s eyes—from frustration, he’s sure. “ _What the hell_ –”

“I’m so fucking tired, Renjun.”

The sudden pang he feels in his chest is so immense he almost stops breathing, so his voice is constricted when he asks, voice laden with incredulity, “ _Tired?_ ”

Jeno avoids his eyes, instead looking at the hoodie that’s found its way into his hands. It’s one he had bought the other, a long time ago. Jeno probably doesn’t remember.

“Look at us, Jun,” Jeno says, just a little bit calmer, voice still seething with all the frustration he's probably let rot inside him.

Renjun doesn’t say anything. The resentment he feels is extremely overwhelming, and he can’t help but think how badly he wants to hurt Jeno, how much he wants him to feel as much pain as he currently does—and, more bitterly, how much this actually, badly hurts.

The other is much calmer when he finally looks up, and Renjun instinctively steps away. 

“I don’t know what to do anymore.”

It’s almost inaudible.

Renjun continues staring. His heart is pounding deafeningly against his eardrums, and his hands are shaking as his fingernails dig into his palms.

“How can you say that so _easily_?” he asks, so softly he himself almost doesn’t hear it. Suddenly he’s thinking about how they should not have gone out tonight, should have just continued playing pretend, and his voice is louder, more grating, when he continues, “If you haven’t noticed, I’m actually trying to fucking do something about our relationship.”

Jeno looks up, as if he can’t believe what he’s saying, huffing before he says, “This is you trying to do something about our relationship?”

“Well, what do you think we should do, Jeno? You're the know-it-all," he taunts. It's one of those things he only thinks of in the middle of a fight, when there's that desire to hurt the other person. There's a spark of hurt in Jeno's eyes, but he doesn't even have time to regret what he's just said. The desire to hurt is greater than whatever else he can possibly feel at the moment. "Tell me, what should we do?”

“Maybe we should have never moved in together,” Jeno bites back, and he’s looking at Renjun so intensely that he almost has to take another step back.

If Jeno regrets his words, he doesn’t show it.

“You’re starting to sound like your mother,” he spits out. The words taste bitter in his mouth. “ _You_ were the one who insisted we move in together.”

Jeno disregards the hoodie back into the drawer and runs his fingers through his hair in frustration.

“ _Maybe I regret it now._ ”

Renjun feels the skin of his palms sting and is not surprised when he finds that his nails have broken through skin. He bites his lips, trying so hard not to let how much pain he’s feeling show. He’s not so sure which one’s painful.

"Sometimes I still feel like you don’t even want to be _here_. I don’t even know how to talk to you anymore.”

“ _Me?_ ” he huffs, gesturing to himself, unable to hide his disbelief. “I’m home more than half the time you even are!”

“Really? Still that? You don't have–”

“You want me to list down everything you do that I can’t stand?” He’s moving towards Jeno before he can even think about it, the anger just taking full control. All the pain’s been swallowed by the need to hurt the other back. Jeno stands his ground, the look on his face challenging him. “You don’t fucking turn off your alarm in the mornings. You complain about things _I do_ when _you also do them!_ You _never_ text me when you’re out! _You’re never home!_ _You keep letting me down like it’s as natural_ –”

“ _I_ let _you_ down? That’s coming from _you_? _Do you hear what you’re saying?_ ”

They’re standing in front of each other now—looking directly at each other’s eyes, neither of them backing down. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” he dares. 

Jeno continues staring down at him. “You’re not the only one dealing with life, Renjun.”

In a relationship, there are lines to never cross.

Right now it feels like they’re both just waiting for the other to cross it.

“What the _hell_ is that supposed to mean?”

Almost eight years together and those lines have already been well-established in a silent understanding—insecurities to never poke fun at, grievances to never pass off as something shallow.

Things to never say, no matter how great the desire to hurt the other person is.

“ _Not everything’s about you!_ ”

He takes a step back.

He’s not sure what’s winning now—the anger or the pain.

He takes another step back, flinching when Jeno grabs his wrist.

“Jun—”

“Don’t touch me,” he whispers.

“Jun, I didn’t mean it that way.”

“I said don’t touch me,” he repeats more firmly, eyes staring at Jeno’s lips absentmindedly.

It's one of those things they can only think of in the middle of a fight, he's sure.

It doesn’t make it hurt even a little bit less.

“Jun, please. I didn’t mean for it to come out like that,” Jeno pleads, pulling him in and holding him tightly. “I’m sorry.”

It’s like all his energy has just drained right out of him, taking everything along with it, leaving inside him the ever-present pit in his being.

“You told me you’d always be with me,” he whispers against the other's collarbone, tears finally falling.

Jeno doesn’t reply.

“You’re a liar. You’re a fucking liar, you know that?”

At this point, he can feel Jeno crying, too, his body slightly shaking.

“Fine, let’s break up. I make you miserable, don't I?” he lets out, trying to pull away. “I’m going out.”

Jeno holds him even more tightly, tries desperately to keep him close. “I never said that. Please, don’t be like this, Jun.”

“Be like what, Jeno?” he asks, pulling away more intently this time. Jeno still doesn’t let go. “I don’t know what I’m like anymore. I don’t know what I want to be, what I’m supposed to be anymore. Now you’re telling me you want to break up with me. What do you think I should do, Jeno? Tell me. _Please_.”

“I don’t know,” Jeno whispers, voice weak.

“Let go,” he says softly. “Please.”

Jeno finally does, and he isn’t sure how he’s supposed to feel.

Donghyuck continues moving about his family’s kitchen, looking for a usable pan and muttering something along the lines of “there are so many useless things around here,” under his breath.

“Jeno and I broke up,” Renjun tells and shrugs his shoulders when Donghyuck pauses to look at him, averting his gaze from the other’s scrutinizing eyes. He busies himself by looking at all the things in front of him— _cheese tortellini, pepper, tomatoes_ —

Before Donghyuck can even say anything, he moves towards one of the cupboards, taking out a saucepan, which he had been watching Donghyuck look for for maybe a whole minute. He says everything like he hadn't been lying on his bed last night, thinking about things over and over and over and over and over. “I officially quit last week, but I handed my notice the day after we ended it. I’ve been meaning to quit anyway, so. And Jeno stayed at Jaemin’s the whole time, if you could believe–”

Donghyuck finally moves and walks to where he is, grabbing the pan from his hands and telling him he also needs a skillet and another bowl, and if he can maybe find somewhere in this kitchen some oregano and basil for this other dish from one of the episodes of the show, which is now on its second season, he’s been meaning to recreate. Renjun aimlessly goes about the kitchen, just as Donghyuck had been doing, not exactly sure where anything is anymore—it’s been a few years since he’s actually been able to call it home.

“We haven’t talked in a long time, huh,” Donghyuck comments when they finally find the long list of things Donghyuck seems to need.

“We haven’t,” he agrees.

The sight of Donghyuck in his house again after a couple of years kind of makes him miss university—all the time they could just meet up (even if they rarely did; university was hard, he's reminded), all the time they would feast on all the grilled pork they could barely afford to celebrate the end of their overlapping hell weeks, or hang out with their seniors to get wasted when they still had the energy for such things, opting for quiet, dark, and definitely suspicious pubs with just themselves as they “began to mature,” as Donghyuck had called it—back when talking about things wasn’t so hard. Or perhaps he’s just looking at things differently now, much differently than they actually had been.

“Is it alright if we talk about everything later?” he asks anyway.

Donghyuck looks a bit taken back for a bit until he’s replying with “Of course,” as if the question was even necessary.

Renjun, for once, allows the feeling that resembles joy, something he hasn't felt in a while, to settle in his chest.

**me:** I’m going back next week. Can you make some time for me?

 **lee jeno:** Are you coming home?

 **lee jeno:** I mean, will you be staying at the apartment?

 **me:** Hyuck is here. I’ll go back with him next week, so I’ll stay with him. I’ll text you when I’ll come by.

 **lee jeno:** Alright. Sure. See you.

 **lee jeno:** Goodnight.

Standing in the middle of what he had called home for the past three years, the person he had shared it with seated on the couch that could only prompt an incredibly deep sense of nostalgia from inside him, is awkward at best and painful at worst. He feels out of place.

He continues standing in the middle of the room, Jeno’s eyes on him as he runs his fingers through his hair, which has grown quite a bit since the last he had properly looked at him. Jeno clears his throat and gestures for him to seat down. He drags his feet as he places himself on the opposite end of their small couch, which feels a lot more smaller now.

“So,” he begins, also clearing his throat. He can still feel Jeno’s eyes on him. Jeno and his purposeful gazes, always looking at him like what he has to say is the most important thing in the world. He takes a deep breath. “I talked to Hyuck. And mom.”

 _Well this is painfully hard_ , he thinks. The silence is immensely heavy. He chews on the inside of his cheek. “About, well. Me. And everything else.”

He wants to glance at Jeno. To check if he’s still looking at him. Instead he turns his head the other way; his eyes are already starting to sting. _This is ridiculous_ , he thinks to himself. _Don’t fucking cry._ “She told me to tell you thank you.”

It takes him a couple more seconds for him to get a hold of his emotions.

When he does, he finally turns to Jeno. 

Jeno’s looking directly at him.

_Don’t fucking cry._

“I told her she should tell you herself.” He shrugs and smiles. It’s a fake one, obviously. They both know that. He hopes his lips aren’t trembling too much. “But I’m telling you anyway.”

He doesn’t wait for a reply, turning his head away from Jeno’s gaze again. _What are you thinking?_ he wants to ask.

“I’ve been thinking a lot,” he continues. The words get stuck in his throat. It takes him quite a while to fully say what he intends to. But Jeno is patient. As he always is. “We’ve been together for almost eight years, but I feel like I haven’t ever thanked you for everything you’ve done for me. So I want to say it now.”

_Don’t fucking cry, please._

“Thanks. For everything. Really.”

The silence that follows is suffocating. It’s too suffocating, and he wants to say something—anything—but his mouth remains shut, the unrelenting silence suffocating the two of them in this small space that had a hundred times comforted them both.

When Jeno finally speaks, his voice is hoarse and low. “I didn’t mean what I said.” As his neck begins to strain, he turns to meet Jeno’s eyes again, only this time Jeno’s not looking at him. Eyes cast down, Jeno continues, “About not everything being about you.”

The sound of people, probably their neighbors they have only interacted with a measly few times, talking loudly outside mingles with the air inside their room. It's still not enough to dissipate the stifling atmosphere, he thinks, desperate for anything to remove the painful discomfort he feels.

It catches him off guard when Jeno turns to look at him again. 

“I really love you, you know that right?”

He feels his chest constrict. Jeno’s quick to break eye contact, turning his eyes to his hands. His hands look paler than usual. He watches Jeno stare at them, waiting.

“I don’t think I’ll ever not love you.” 

There’s a hundred questions running through his mind.

_How have you been? What did you eat every morning? Were you able to sleep well?_

_Why didn’t you call?_

He’ll never know.

He can’t ever ask them now.

“And this isn't easy for me, either, unlike what you’ve probably been thinking.” He says it so softly that he wonders if he was even meant to hear it. “You know, sometimes, I’d look at you, and I’d think everything was— _is_ about you.” Jeno continues staring at his hands as he speaks. Mindlessly staring at them, turning them over repeatedly. It almost feels like he’s not really there, even though he is. “You’re… everything. I love you that much.”

He wants to say something.

Of course, he doesn’t.

He can’t.

There are no words with him right now. All he can think about is how much he doesn’t want to hear this. He doesn’t want to hear this, doesn’t want to hear what he’s about to say next.

“And, I’d get happy, but also overwhelmed, and I don’t know how to say it. But, I see us these days, you know? And I–we love each other so much, so how come we’re not happy?”

He looks away, crouching down to rest his elbows on his thighs, turning to look at his hands as well.

_I don’t want to hear this._

“And I know that I haven’t always understood all the things you’re going through. And I still don’t understand a lot of things about everything. But I do want you to be happy, Renjun. I want you to be fine, and happy. That’s what I want. I want to help you, but I don’t know how.”

He only realizes he’s crying when tears drop onto his open hands. His vision is blurry, and his cheeks are wet. It’s like the wall of a dam has collapsed. It’s like the wall of a dam has collapsed, and he can’t do anything about it now. All he can do is feel the pain in his chest and cry. 

“And I feel helpless. And I get frustrated, and sometimes, it’s hard.”

_I don’t want to hear this._

“To be with you.”

Jeno says it softly, but it hurts all the same.

It hurts more than he thinks it’s even possible to hurt.

“Sometimes I don’t think you’re happy with me.”

“I _am_ ,” he whispers. He’s not sure Jeno hears.

“Like, sometimes, I wonder if I make you miserable. And I–I’m not just doing this for you. I’m doing this for me, too.” Jeno’s voice cracks a bit when he continues, and that’s the only time Renjun realizes he’s crying, too. “And I hope that’s okay.”

“Of course.” Renjun can’t stop the tears falling. “ _Of course_.”

At this moment, Renjun remembers why he had loved— _loves_ —Jeno so much. And it’s like everything else disappears, and all that’s left is sadness. And love. _Love_.

He wonders if he’s going to be okay without Jeno’s love.

“I love you,” he tells him _._ “You’re one of the few I can wholeheartedly say I love completely. You–You’re the only one who can actually make me so happy.” He wants to stop crying, but the tears won’t stop. The words rush out of his mouth. He’s not even sure what he’s saying anymore. If they even make sense. “But sometimes, I’d look at you. A–And… And you seem so _happy_. And sometimes _so_ far away, you know? Like, I–I’d look at myself, and I feel like I’m just _me_ , the way I’ve always been.” The sobs that escape his lips are ridiculous. _This is ridiculous_ , he thinks. _How can it hurt so much? “_ And I’d look at you and you’re this whole person I can’t recognize anymore. And maybe there’s this part of me that hates it. Because. I’m _me_. Like I've always been. And _just_.”

When Jeno turns to him and takes him into his arms, placing his small body on his lap, he cries even harder. The crook of his neck feels familiar. _Don’t hold me like this,_ he wants to say, but he finds himself clinging on to him, desperate. “I don’t know, Jeno. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

“It’s okay,” Jeno tells him, one hand on the back of his head, slim fingers running through his hair, the other trying on his back, trying to calm him down. _Don’t hold me like this, please._

“No, it’s not.” The side of his head feels wet, and their tears mix together that he’s not sure who’s crying more now. “I’m sorry. For everything. And thank you for always being there. I know I wasn’t the easiest to love.”

“That’s not true,” Jeno whispers against his temple. “That’s not true.”

He’s not sure how long they stay like that. There’s a part of him that finds how they’re positioned ridiculous, but he feels drained, and Jeno doesn’t say anything—doesn’t say anything and just holds him in his arms.

Way past when the sun has set, when the only light in the living room is what little amount of light coming from the few streetlamps outside their apartment can get inside, they finally talk about things. They remain like that—Renjun on Jeno’s lap, face buried on the crook of the other’s neck, Jeno’s arms wrapped around him, one hand rubbing his back. They talk about so many things that he probably won’t remember them all. He hopes he does. He hopes he gets to keep this.

They talk about what they’re going to do with the apartment, if he needs to pay anything. About what Renjun’s going to do in China. What his mom said about Jeno. If he’s going to therapy when he gets home. If he’ll come visit Seoul sometimes (he doesn’t ever come back, only keeping in contact with Mark and Donghyuck after he moves back to Jilin). If he’ll be okay. Jeno talks a lot too. Much more than he usually does. Tells him how he was when Renjun wasn’t around. What he’s been up to. What he's gonna do after.

It’s unreal, really. It doesn’t make sense, but it also perfectly does.

 _This is okay_ , he repeats to himself.

He doesn’t know how long they stay like that, but when everything hits him again, when he feels the tears threatening to fall once more, he tells Jeno he should go.

“Thanks for meeting me today,” he says, standing outside the door. “Hyuck will come with me next weekend to fix everything.”

Jeno nods, holding the door open. “Okay.”

“Okay.”

Jeno looks at him for a while, as if he has something to say, or at least that’s how it seems to Renjun.

But he doesn’t say anything, so Renjun leaves.

< >

Sometimes, before, when he was feeling particularly sentimental, lying side-by-side with Jeno, he’d have moments where he’d think, _Is there anyone else in this world who’ll make me feel whole the way Jeno does?_

Lately he’s been lying on his bed, no Jeno by his side, just thinking about all the interactions he’s had with him. The good ones. Bad ones. Not-so-special ones. The overwhelming amount of time he now has has been spent on obsessing about a lot of things, like trying to figure out why they broke up—if they really had to. He tries to think back, tries to find a reason why things ended the way they did, never really able to come up with a reason that seemed good enough. These days focusing on other things seems impossible, one full movie on Netflix feeling like a task to be accomplished rather than reprieve. Renjun can’t decide whether he would rather have more days when he’s neck-deep in sensibility or days when he doesn’t feel anything, only that life’s a bore, _everything’s a bore_ , and there’s no meaning to anything.

Still, he thinks of Jeno.

He remembers how Jeno had told him he loved him.

The first time he did, back when saying the words out loud still wasn't too overly romantic for them, when the high of having their first serious relationship still made them want to spend every single minute of their days together—walking to and from class together whenever they could, calling each other late at night to talk until the morning, touching each other with a greed and need they both didn't know existed within them.

It wasn't anything special, really, but he recalls it with fondness. He doesn’t even remember what they had been talking about before that particular moment, nor what had happened on that particular day. What he remembers is how silent the night had felt, how peaceful; the night had been slow, as if the whole world had paused and they were the only ones there, safe in the four corners he had also begun calling home, just because Jeno had been there. Maybe it's silly to turn someone into his home, he thinks now, untethered—not sure where to belong.

Jeno was probably talking about something else entirely. The words had just slipped. But when they did, they had looked at each other, their breaths caught in their throats. Just looking at each other. Then Renjun had kissed him senseless, shamelessly whispering it back, over and over and over.

He thinks about it now, wonders if Jeno's ever thought about it again.

He wonders if a few years from now, he'll still think of it fondly, if it'll still mean something.

It's both terrifying and comforting, thinking that everything just continues, always.

  
  


“Do you think things will be better when we’re older?”

“Maybe.”

“You know, you make thinking about the future a bit bearable.”

A smile, languid.

“What am I going to do without you?”

“Still gonna be you, hm?”

“But I don’t want to be me.”

It had taken Jeno a while to reply then, he remembers, the circles still running on his back the only indication that he was still awake.

“Jun.”

“Hm?”

“I guess there will always, just, you know, be mess.”

A sigh, then a kiss to his temple.

“We’ll just have to learn which ones to deal with and how to deal with them, okay?”

The circles had stopped then, arms encircling him tighter.

“And I’ll be with you.”

“Five, ten years from now?”

The laugh Jeno had given him then was a token he had wanted to keep safe in a pocket somewhere in his heart.

“I hope so.”

He wonders if he was able to keep it, if it’s still there.

“And, well. Even if I’m not, I know you’re going to be okay. Okay?"

A smile, at ease.

On this night, Renjun lets himself believe it.

He sits in the same place he had sat a couple of years ago, when Jeno had asked him to move in with him. This time, it's Mark beside him.

There are still a few weeks to go before winter begins, but people are already wearing thick padded coats. He wonders how they look like—two grown men just silently sitting there. It's already almost sunset, but the few number of people, just like them, seem to have no plans of ending the day just yet. The park looks different now without the snow and in the afternoon. Almost like it's an entirely different place from the one in his memory.

"Hey," Mark says, a bit hesitant.

He looks far ahead, wondering if he should've brought Mark someplace else, especially since it's his first time in his hometown. "Yeah?"

The sky turns a bit orange, and suddenly he wonders what Jeno's doing at the moment, if he's thought of him the past couple of weeks. If he remembers that they were supposed to travel when they turn 30, only a few years from now, how he feels about that never happening now. If he feels even just a bit regretful.

"So," Mark begins, still hesitant. Renjun taps his fingers on the raised platform where they're seated, looking at some teens laugh while biking. It triggers something in him, but he’s not so sure what. " _Uhm_ , you know how we aren’t really the emotional sort of friends?"

Renjun smiles at Mark's awkward laugh, watches as he turns to his back to admire the small temple that rests above the platform. When he had come here with Jeno, Donghyuck, and Jaemin, they hadn't really been able to admire the number of temples and monuments, having arrived a bit late. Still, it had shown a different kind of beauty from the beauty it shows him now—the orange hues from the lights replaced by the orange and red hues from the setting sun.

"Well. Not having you in the office seemed really weird. And they miss you a lot. Especially our boss-boss. Says he misses talking to the only person who had some sense. Not sure he’s allowed to say that."

Renjun laughs, thinking about his perfect office floor and the comfortable bean bags they had. He doesn't really miss it, but he does miss some of the people he had met there.

"And about Jeno—"

"You don't have to say anything about him," he says, voice not really betraying any of his feelings. It's just calm right now, serene.

They fall silent for a bit, both of them looking at how the orange has changed to purple with shades of pink.

"You know you can talk to me, right?"

"I do," he replies, genuine. He thinks about how lucky he must have been to be able to have found people who try so hard to understand him, even if sometimes they don’t—just like he didn't understand them sometimes. He feels like he hasn't been okay for a long time, like the pit has been dug up quite deeply for a while. But then there are moments like this. The scene in front of him is beautiful, the colors putting a blanket over the world, filling it up just rightly, and a part of him wishes he can show it to Jeno, too. He wonders if he'll see something so beautiful next year, or 5 years from now, or maybe even 10 years from now. 

He wonders how he'll be like then.

Somehow, right now, he's not so afraid.

< >

He lets his eyes linger on his former lover’s face brimming with happiness, his eyes turning to sweet crescents. He lets himself think back to nights from years ago—bodies huddled close together, legs intertwined, hushed words of reassurance exchanged—spent looking at that same loving smile.

“He looks happy."

Mark looks at him—waits for him to go on. And he does, turning back to look at the man beside him, a smile on his face.

“I’m happy, too," he says out loud.

This time he means it.

He isn’t always happy. And there are still a lot of bad days. And there’s always mess he has to deal with. But he’s going to be okay.

**Author's Note:**

> [ edited 200604, rewrote some things but the details are the same ! ]
> 
> this was meant to be just some simple / breaking up moving on being happy with somebody else / fic inspired by Oh Wonder’s Happy,,,,,, but this happened idk sksdkal
> 
> i've been having a lot of / feelings / lately and wanted to explore them, i started this last Jan but a lot of things happened so i was only able to finish it now ;;
> 
> the movie mentioned is WKW’s Chungking Express lol
> 
> also this was supposed to be a noren then markren at the end LOL but i decided not to do it bec u dont need an s/o to be better!


End file.
